The purpose of the study is to examine the quality of life in those who have mental illness living in a community, especially the correlation between social support and life satisfaction, therefore, the extent of social support that the mentally disor...
The purpose of the study is to examine the quality of life in those who have mental illness living in a community, especially the correlation between social support and life satisfaction, therefore, the extent of social support that the mentally disordered suppose themselves getting from their family members, friends, relatives, and neighborhoods, etc through their won subjective evaluations on life satisfaction was studied, and lastly the correlation between social support and life satisfaction.
The results of the study are as follows:
1. The analysis of any differences between social support level and the following matters such as sex, marital status, religion, occupation, age, educational standard, monthly income of the subjects who were under survey resulted in as follows: In case of profession, it was found out to be relevant at the level of p<0.01, educational standard, p<0.001, family's monthly income, p<0.05, no other matters were found to be relevant.
2. The characteristics of the subjects' life satisfaction showed that the extent of life satisfaction evaluated by them in their whole lives was on average 2.5650(sd=1.0517) points on the maximum scale of 5 points, the results from life satisfaction by 8 sub-areas are in the following orders: "physical and mental health(3.0946), relationship with family members and relatives(2.81847), job and daily schedule(2.7143), residential environment(2.6934), self-image and general life(2.6161), relationship with friends and other people(2.5492), recreational activities(2.5315), food, clothing, and economic status(2.4524)."
3. It was the religion(P is 0.0310, relevant at the level of p<0.05) and the educational standard(p=0.0001, relevant at the level of p<0.001) of the subjects which had served as variables that could make a difference between life satisfaction and the relevant characteristics among sex, marital status, religion, profession, age, educational level, monthly income of their family members, and among the characteristics connected with mental illness was there an age in which disorders had been taken no other matters were found to be relevant.
4. The structural feature of social support, according to network size, type, frequency of meeting, and duration of relationship, revealed that the magnitude of social network averaged 4.69 people of the mentally disordered, that of network type averaged 1.9 in numbers, a term of relationship was above an average of 10 years, and it showed their daily meeting. The functional feature of social support is the one whose members were given within the frame of social network. the study revealed that the extent of social support was an average of 2.2076(sd=0.6123) points on the maximum scale of 3 points. and social support by the sub-areas was in the following orders: "instrumental support(2.2732), emotional support(2.2696), evaluational support(2.1446), informational support(2.1428)."
5. The study revealed that among the structural/functional features of social support, were there social network scale, frequency of meeting, and respective social support as a variable associated with life satisfaction, and also life satisfaction was greatly affected by the functional attribute of which the subjects themselves were conscious from their family members, companions, relatives rather than by the structural property of social support. thus, it is necessary that an intervention plan be made to improve the standard of life satisfaction by intensifying the magnitude, frequency of meeting, social supporting function which turned out to be a significant variable.